The Bronze Buckaroo

Richard C. Kahn, 1939

Structurally speaking, The Bronze Buckaroo is a quintessential B Western of the 1930s. The film begins when Texas cowboy Bob Blake (Herb Jeffries) responds to a letter from his friend, Joe Jackson, asking for urgent help. When Blake and his crew arrive at Joe Jackson’s ranch, Betty Jackson, Joe’s sister, reveals that Joe has disappeared a few weeks prior. Immediately, Blake, the film’s white-horse-riding-hero, sets out to find his friend. It doesn’t take long for Blake to discover the film’s villain in the form of Buck Thorne, a local rancher who will stop at nothing to get Jackson’s ranch. From there, it’s the typical battle of good guys versus bad guys, cherished by Western-loving film fanatics. In this structural sense, any casual Western viewer can quite accurately anticipate how this film will turn out.

However, what makes this film interesting is its cast: The Bronze Buckaroo is an ethnic film consisting of an entirely African American cast. While the main aspects of the plot remain vigilantly faithful to the Western genre, the characters and the actors (and actress, as in yes, there is only one female in the movie) who play them refuse to embody the stereotypical roles usually thrust upon African Americans. This film, as with all black films of the 1930s, was produced with the aim to represent African Americans fairly. Through these ethnic films, African American actors could escape the roles of unwitting sources of comedic relief to become stars in their own shows. In The Bronze Buckaroo, Herb Jeffries becomes such a star. Not only does Jeffries walk, talk, and shoot like the American cowboy, he also sings. That’s right, The Bronze Buckaroo is not just an all-black Western, but an all-black Western musical. Suck on that Hollywood! (That’s probably not appropriate for a film review.) Notably, the songs in this film seem to have also been specifically targeted towards African American audiences––they tend to be call-and-response numbers rather than a star soloing through a cumbersome variety of pitches and tones.

All in all, The Bronze Buckaroo is remarkably entertaining. Taking into account the very limited budget of an all-black B Western musical, the film is quite cohesive and the actors (mostly) convincing. Although the film adheres to the tropes of its genre, it does not fail to provide small pockets of the unexpected. For example, early in the film, ranch hand Slim Perkins uses ventriloquism to trick newcomer Dusty into buying a “talking” mule. Throughout the film, Slim and Dusty engage in similar antics against each other to act as a welcoming source of comedy. By the time the end credits role, The Bronze Buckaroo has presented itself as a very versatile film––one that will appeal to lovers of Westerns, admirers of musicals, and enthusiasts of African American culture and the black film industry of the 1930s.

Charlie Diehl